November 2013, arsenal cinema

Claude Lanzmann: "Le dernier des injustes"

LE DERNIER DES INJUSTES, 2013

Almost 40 years after conducting his interviews in 1975 with Benjamin Murmelstein, the last "Elder of the Jews" in Theresienstadt, Claude Lanzmann has returned to him and made him the protagonist of his new film – he searches for the places named by Murmelstein, reconstructs the events he described, complements his words with passages from files, traces his stories and shows the terrible dilemma the "last of the unjust" was in when he carried out the orders of the Nazis, trying as their puppet to "pull the strings himself" as far as was possible. Lanzmann says he is the "absolute opposite of a collaborator" and wants to do him justice. (rr) A Deutsche Kinemathek and Berlin International Film Festival event in conjunction with Arsenal – Institute for Film and Video Art. (24.11., with the guest appearance of Claude Lanzmann)